Planeta

When my friend Rob from Sigonella was here, and before the other Americans arrived bearing gifts of peanut butter and bacon, we decided to check out some wineries, or cantinas as they are called here, or more appropriately, cantine.

Anyway, we got over to the Planeta cantina, and my friend Alessio was just leaving the one in Menfi to go to the one in Sambuca. (For those of you who missed it, I described meeting Alessio in the post Italian Royalty, posted on February 1st, although it was supposed to be posted on April 1st. It is worth going back and reading.) Alessio left us in capable hands, and although we were not there for a tour, but rather just to buy some wine, we got a neat tour of the bottling operation.

Planeta has four cantine here in Sicily, each growing specific grapes in specific conditions to produce the wines they want to produce. The wines are then either barrelled or put in stainless steel vats for the pre bottling aging process. Sicilian wines are generally young wines, and it is usually the whites that are put only in vats. The reds spend some time in oak barrels, and some time in stainless steel vats. Every year, before the new grapes are crushed, someone from the Campo Forestale comes around to make sure that the vats have been appropriately cleaned, and are ready for the new grape juice.

Even though Planeta operates four cantine, they have only one bottling operation, as there is a lot of equipment required. They bring the wine ready for bottling to the Menfi Cantina for bottling and then for storage, labelling, and distribution.

We were there as the workers were taking their lunch break (it was not really a pranzo), and they just started the line going toward the end of our time there. They were bottling their 2007 Merlot wine, from near Noto, in the east of Sicily. The new bottles were all washed, dried, and then filled with the Merlot and corked. The corks, before they are squeezed and put into the wine bottles, are about twice the size of what we see when we open a bottle. It was really amazing for me to see how big the unused corks are.

Then the bottles were stacked in huge crates, where they will sit for six or seven months before labels are applied and they are ready for shipping. This avoids people getting wine that is 'bottle shocked', as someone at a winery in the California wine country called it, as she tried to sell us several bottles to cellar. Here, they cellar it for you for a bit, so that you do not open it before its time. Good idea.

We also got to see where they were bottling some magnums. I now have a dream of having a party, and opening a few magnum bottles of the Merlot for my guests. Those bottles are impressive.

We also got to taste the Merlot, before it was placed in the bottles. It was ready to drink as far as I am concerned, and I can not wait until it is ready to sell.

Thank you Planeta wineries and staff for a wonderful few hours watching you bottle wine, tasting your wine, and best yet, selling us a few bottles to take with us and enjoy with the others Americans when they came to visit. Yum.
And yes, my friends, these wines have been mentioned in Wine Spectator, and I have seen them in a few stores and restaurants in the US.